An English language blog for Sporting Clube de Portugal.

Main menu

Tag Archives: João Gonçalves

It’s been a busy week for Sporting with a few games, the close of the transfer window, and the Europa League groups drawn so it’s time for another huge round-up of all the Sporting news.

First, we’ll catch up with Sporting’s last two games in which Sporting had varying success.

The first was a massively disappointing 0-1 defeat at home to Rio Ave. Edimar’s well worked goal in the 40th minute was enough for the visitors to secure the win. The game was typical of the first opening games for Sporting. Sporting had plenty of possession but failed to break through the Rio Ave defence and at times looked hugely out of ideas – and when they did make chances proceeded to miss them. In the second-half also saw the debut of the new Argentine forward Valentín Viola.

After the game Ricardo Sá Pinto was furious and promised a win and goals in the next game in the Europa League against AC Horsens. Last week the sides drew 1-1 and Horsens goalkeeper Frederik Rønnow stole the show.

Sá Pinto’s side truly delivered with a thumping 5-0 victory to secure a place in the Europa League group stages (draw to follow). Danijel Pranjić started ahead of Emiliano Insúa at left-back to make his full Sporting debut.

Ricky van Wolfswinkel, who had been misfiring in previous games, opened the scoring after 8 minutes with a lovely half-volleyed finish. Thomas Kortegaard was unfortunate to see a ball bounce cruelly off his knee and then into the net to put Sporting 2-0 ahead at half-time.

After the restart Ricky van Wolfswinkel got his second goal from close range after some poor Horsens defending from a corner. André Carrillo scored the goal of the game when his superb strike from the edge of the area hit the underside of the cross bar and went in before a good Elias strike finished the hammering.

On Friday 31st August came the Europa League draw which saw Sporting drew in Group G alongside FC Basel, KRC Genk, and Videoton FC.

Interestingly, Hungarian side Videoton are managed by one-time Sporting player Paulo Sousa. As well as that Renato Neto is also on loan at the Hungarian club from Sporting and it is where former Sporting player Marco Caneira is currently playing.

Speaking of Rui Patrício. Patrício signed a new contract with the club keeping him at the club now until the end of the 2017/2018 season. On top of that Rui Patrício’s release clause has been increased to €40,000,000.

So now to the transfers.

Sporting completed only one transfer in to the club and that was of Júlio Alves (brother of Bruno Alves) joining Sporting B on loan for the season from Turkish club Beşiktaş.

There were plenty of moves out of the club though, albeit almost all loan deals…

Florent Sinama Pongolle cancelled his contract with Sporting meaning he is now a free agent. Pongolle spent last season on loan at Saint-Étienne and will be widely remembered as being one of Sporting’s most wasteful signings.

Wilson Eduardo will be spending next season on loan at Académica after almost making it into the first team this year.

Valeri Bojinov, who was certainly never going to play for Sporting again, has moved on loan to Hellas Verona. Bojinov had long been rumoured to be joining Torino but ended up at Hellas instead.

Another B-Team defender, Atila Turan, will be in Turkey next season playing for Orduspor. He’ll be playing alongside former Sporting player Miguel Garcia.

And finally, in the most surprising move, Oguchi Onyewu will be playing for Málaga next year. Onyewu did little wrong last season with Sporting but his loan deal will mean he get more first-team football. The arrivals of Rojo and Boulahrouz made his departure more likely.

So there you have it! The B-Team are facing Marítimo B later today with a report to follow later.

Oceano’s Sporting B picked up their first win of the season with a 1-0 victory over 10-men Vitória de Guimarães B thanks to Ricardo Esgaio’s penalty.

There were two changes from the team that lost in the first game to Oliveirense with Nii Plange and Gaël Etock coming in for Filipe Chaby and the suspended Diego Rubio.

The game though was poor in quality with the little action from either side. The key moment of the game came 7 minutes before half-time when Guimarães goalkeeper Assis was sent off by referee Rui Silva for taking down a Sporting forward in a one-on-one situation resulting in a penalty.

The Vitória B manager Luíz Felipe sacrificed Tiago Almeida to bring on goalkeeper Miguel Oliveira. The 18-year-old goalkeeper was then sent the wrong way by Ricardo Esgaio’s cool penalty.

At the start of the second half Oceano was forced into a substitution as Santiago Arias looked to have picked up an injury and was replaced by João Gonçalves.

The rest of the game continued in the slow-paced manner it had began. Vitória de Guimarães now with one man shorter were more determined to remain organised and prevent Sporting from scoring again.

This led to an uneventful half but it does mean Sporting B get their first win of the season with the next game away to Sporting Clube da Covilhã on Wednesday.

Sporting’s beginning to the a promising new season didn’t exactly go as many had planned at home to Olhanense. Wilson Eduardo’s superb strike against his parent club meant Sporting would have to come from behind but were unable to score until Marat Izmailov’s 77th minute goal.

The game marked the official debuts of a whole host of new signings; Alberto Rodríguez, Fabián Rinaudo, Stijn Schaars, Jeffrén, Diego Rubio, and Diego Capel. It showed too, as there was a lack of cohesion in the team going forward, for all of the Sporting possession there lacked a cutting edge. It’s a familiar theme to last season although there’s still plenty of hope for the rest of the season.

Somewhat surprising was that Domingos Paciência did not go for the 4-1-3-2 formation that had been prevalent through-out most of pre-season instead opting for 3 in midfield with Schaars the more advanced ahead of Rinaudo and André Santos.

Another surprise was that Paciência left Daniel Carriço on the bench instead choosing Ânderson Polga and Alberto Rodríguez as the centre-back pairing and meaning João Pereira captained the team.

It was 29 minutes until Wilson Eduardo’s goal put Olhanense ahead. Wilson Eduardo is one of 3 Sporting players on loan at Olhanense currently along side João Gonçalves and Mexer. There will be concerns with how Eduardo was able to get his shot away without being closed down sooner but the strike was so good that Rui Patrício, on his 62nd consecutive Liga start, could do nothing. It should be noted that Wilson Eduardo did not celebrate after scoring.

The goal was against the run of play though, Hélder Postiga was unlucky not to have scored by that point with Olhanense’s Brazilian goalkeeper Fabiano doing well to prevent a Postiga header and a Jeffrén drive.

There was a controversial moment too after Jeffrén’s well saved shot as the ball bounced back out there looked to be a hand used by the Olhanense player but the referee, Carlos Xistra, did not give a penalty.

In the second half again a Jeffrén delivery caused danger with Hélder Postiga getting on the end of it with a header but it went narrowly wide of the goal.

The equaliser came in the 77th minute with a long cross from Evaldo found Marat Izmailov at the back post who’s shot was well saved by Fabiano but the goalkeeper could only rebound the ball back in to Izmailov’s feet and then passed it calmly into the net.

In the 89th minute a Stijn Schaars strike went narrowly wide to win the game for Sporting but the game finished 1-1.

Although performance wise this wasn’t the worst for Sporting the lack of finishing may well be a concern. Sporting next face Nordsjælland away on Thursday before the next league game in Aveiro away to Beira-Mar.